Talk:The Ebony Warrior/Archive 1
Mentioned before in the strategy section, the beast form was very effective on The Ebony Warrior. It only took a few hits to kill him. Having all the perks for the beast form makes it much easier, as when you use the bloodhowl, the two pack members are summoned (Red ghost-like werewolves) and three werewolves against the ebony warrior is a win. The Ebony Warrior will keep getting knocked to the ground, making him vulnerable. He cannot attack you either, and it takes quite some time just for him to rebalance himself and stand up. So I recommend using the beast form. Most armour is quite ineffective, well for me it was. I wore a full legendary set of Deadric Armour and used two legendary Dragonbone Daggers but it didn't make much of a difference. So, the beast form alone with all perks (and the first perk has to be chosen 4 times) and the usage of the bloodhowl, should kill The Ebony Warrior within a few hits, and for all that said it was "too easy", seriously, it wasn't... 05:11, April 2, 2014 (UTC) Strategies *The Ebony Warrior is extremely difficult to beat in melee fights as he has the Reflect Blows perk in the heavy armor skill tree, and the Dragonborn can end up doing large amounts of damage to him- or herself without doing much to the warrior. Coupled with the extreme amount of melee damage he can deal, it is wise for the Dragonborn to not face him head on unless they have extremely high health and are close to or have hit the armor cap (80% damage reduction at 567 armor rating). *It is wise to have a follower accompanying the Dragonborn if they intend to fight the warrior melee as it can provide a distraction whilst the Dragonborn kills the warrior, however the follower can die very quickly so caution is needed if using this tactic. However, if the Dragonborn has Mjoll the Lioness or any other essential follower accompanying them then this risk can be avoided. *If the Dragonborn has the impact perk in the Destruction skill tree, a good tactic is to stagger-lock the warrior and slowly wear him down so he cannot heal himself or attack the Dragonborn. This tactic is especially potent as a level 80+ Dragonborn is likely to have enchanted apparel that drastically reduces or even completely eliminates destruction spell cost. *The Last Vigil, where the fight takes place, is located on the precipice of many cliffs, so a good tactic is for the Dragonborn to try and position the warrior between the cliff and themselves so he or she can use the Unrelenting Force shout to blow the warrior over the edge. However, this will not actually kill the warrior outright due to his extremely high health, so it must be repeated to kill him. *With a high enough Sneak (Skyrim) skill, the backstab perk coupled with shrouded gloves (obtained from the Dark Brotherhood), the Dragonborn can land sneak attacks which do enough damage to severely weaken the Ebony Warrior and make the subsequent fight much easier, or even kill him in one hit. *Using the Elemental Fury shout while dual-wielding can be a good way to bring the Ebony Warrior down. 17:42, August 17, 2014 (UTC) *There is a ledge on a cliff directly above the warrior, which if the Dragonborn can reach provides a good location to shoot the warrior with bows or magic. *Also you can try to use Mehrunes Razor with a small chance to instantly kill him. *It's quite easy to defeat him while in Beast Form with only a few hits, especially considering a werewolf's power attacks have a high chance of throwing him to the ground and/or instantly killing him. You don't even receive a bounty for transforming in front of him, and even in Beast Form, the Ebony Warrior will not turn hostile until you land the first hit. *Your battle with the Ebony Warrior is an excellent opportunity for you to use the Jarrin Root poison, when you have completed the Dark Brotherhood quests. With enough skill in alchemy, the poison can kill the warrior instantly, dealing over 6500 points of damage. *If you are a high-level alteration mage, the spell Dragonhide is an effective tool, as it ignores 80% of physical damage for 30+ seconds. Furthermore, combining this with other defence improving spells such as Ebonyflesh or even the fully powered Dragon Aspect is even more effective. Remember you can cast spells such as Dragonhide just before attacking the Ebony Warrior. *Another effective strategy is to use a weapon with a drain health enchantment, which can help to negate the enchantment on his sword, and potentially more, especially if you have a high level in enchantment. However, if you are keen to use enchantments against the Ebony Warrior, remember that he is heavily resistent to elemental enchantments, so try using enchantments which drain health, magicka or stamina, especially the first (or potentially the latter, if you want to prevent him using power attacks). *Don't forget spells such as Become Ethereal, especially if you are low in health and need to heal, this shout can give you a few necessary seconds to do just that. Remember as long as you don't interact with anything / the ebony warrior, the shout won't wear off until the time limit is reached. *The Slow Time shout is also useful for the fight against the Ebony Warrior. The Dragonborn can outflank the Ebony Warrior and then land several hits on him before the shout expires. *Summoning Karstaag , a power which can be gained from defeating the snow giant in Castle Karstagg, can also be effective. However, remember that Karstagg can only be summoned 3 times, so think carefully before using the power. *Another particularly easy way to best him is by using the Shield Charge perk to permanently keep him on the ground. *Using Windshear which has a 100% stagger rate can make for an easy kill as he can not attack you. *It is also a good strategy to take mastery in Limb Splitter or Bone Breaker as both warhammer and mace weaponary will ignore up to 75% of his unbalance armor rating. *Here is a video of many of these strategies in action (and more). *The Deathbrand armor set with Bloodscythe and Soulrender can be a powerful combination against the Ebony Warrior, especially with enough investment in the One-Handed and Smithing. As the enchantments with wearing the full set and weilding both swords can cause a serious amount of damage to him quickly. *You can pickpocket the warriors arrows and potions, making the fight much easier. Be warned: a high pickpocket skill is needed. *Using Dragon Aspect to give you better armour and if you go on low health, an old Dragonborn can help you. Having lots of healing and stamina potions (for doing more power attacks). Having a good follower like Marcurio is a good help too. Just before you fight him, do Dragon Aspect and shout for Odahviing or Durnehviir after so he can also help. Have a good healing spell too. *With a high enough Block (skill), it is possible to disarm the Ebony Warrior of all weapons using the Disarming Bash perk, leaving him with only his fists. Also, it is advisable to push him down the mountain with the Shield Charge perk so that he cannot pick his weapons back up. Just be careful not to die going down after him. Dragonhide + Ebonyflesh + Dragon Aspect? *If you are a high-level alteration mage, the spell Dragonhide is an effective tool, as it ignores 80% of physical damage for 30+ seconds. Furthermore, combining this with other defense improving spells such as Ebonyflesh or even the fully powered Dragon Aspect is even more effective. Remember you can cast spells such as Dragonhide just before attacking the Ebony Warrior. :: I have a high-level alteration mage, and I don't believe these spells stack to give you more than 80% damage resistance. For one thing, Dragonhide doesn't show up in the list of active effects when you cast all three. It seems it is replaced by Ebonyflesh, and it will not work while that spell is active. I am under the impression that 80% is an absolute cap for physical damage reduction. But, if I am wrong and you are able to exceed it, I would be very curious as to exactly how you achieved that, and in what order you had to cast the spells. ::: 02:56, November 16, 2013 (UTC)ThePirateKing22 Too easy to beat? *Does anyone else think he's too easy to beat with for a level 80+ dragonborn? I'm hitting over 1000 damage per hit with my dual-wielding warrior (legitamately), and have about 550 health with 1200 armor rating so the fight was pretty easy even if I was playing on master difficulty, though his reflect blows perk did cause me a bit a trouble :L TheJ00baby (talk) 13:13, December 16, 2012 (UTC) *That's really funny - seeing as in how you can't get over 600 armor rating "legitimately". Enjoy stroking your own ego. :') GarouxBloodline **That's not necessarily true, G.B. - if you have enough skill level and perks invested in smithing and armor, a 1000-ish armor rating is certainly possible with the right gear/potions. One of my builds wears full legendary Daedric, with Well Fitted, Matching Set, and all five Juggernaut perks, as well as the Ancient Knowledge permanent. Without a shield, he's just under 1100. Of course, since AR caps out at 567, something that absurdly high isn't much more than a bragging point, so take that how you will. Spiegel1 (talk) 23:40, December 27, 2012 (UTC) ***1000+ armor rating sure can be reached legitimately, but not 1000 damage per hit in melee (unless you count backstabs). 20:55, January 13, 2013 (UTC) ***um yeah it can, 100 one handed with all perks, necromage vampire (all potions + enchants 25% more powerful), 100 enchanting, alchemy and smithing all with max perks, then a set of fortify smithing gear as well as a fortify smithing potion, leaves me with 612 per sword. I then have a complete set of daedric armor (1274 armor rating) custom enchanted with fortify 1-handed, which leaves me 1053 damage per hit (2106 dual wielding) . TheJ00baby (talk) 22:52, January 13, 2013 (UTC) ****It's not legit if you exploit the alchemy/enchanting/smithing loop 18:56, January 14, 2013 (UTC) ****I'm pretty sure it is tbh, I put in a f**k ton of money and a lot of hours into getting all my crafting skills to 100; the only non-legit way to get 1000 damage would be to use the restoration potion glitch. Also, without crafting skills and enchating its virtually impossible to play a level 81 warrior on master difficulty as you die way too fast. Admittedly, 1000 damage is a bit excessive, but in my opinion you still need to be hitting 350+ at levels above 60. TheJ00baby (talk) 19:51, January 14, 2013 (UTC) *I kind of agree with TheJ00baby. My dragonborn has pretty high health (around 550 as well) with armor cap and, with a fortify two-handed potion, fortify health potion, and a fully powered Marked for Death shout, I took him out in only a few hits. He did get me in a Fus Ro Da, but I angled myself to where my back was to the mountain and stayed that way and didn't fly very far. Thyra Steelheart 23:23, December 27, 2012 (UTC) *he was too easy for sure, my dragonborn has 868 health, max armor, and 81% magic resist (cap is 85%) and i beat him with only fists,shouts and powers. i used no weapons, magic, or healing items and he still never got me past half health. 22:07, January 4, 2013 (UTC) *Of course he was too easy. 1-shot him from stealth. Use crafting. Windshear stunlock. Shield bash stunlock. Impact stunlock. Paralyze. Fear. Pickpocket all his gear. Werewolf knockback spam. Vampiric grip spam. Follower/conjuration army. All of these are "legit" and all of these make him a walk in the park. You have to go out of your way to not be overpowered at this point. Rayzorium (talk) 10:06, January 20, 2013 (UTC) *Thats so true, whatever playstyle you're using by level 81 (mage, warrior, assassin etc) then your still going to be almost unstoppably powerful. Though how do you get fear powerful enough to work on a level 80+? Never really used illusion for my mage and for my assassin I only used invis + muffle so I don't know much about it :L TheJ00baby (talk) 12:47, January 20, 2013 (UTC) **Perks! Rout works on level 20 enemies. Aspect of Terror and Kindred Mage are both +10, so that's 40 total. Illusion Dual Casting multiplies the total by 2.2, so it will work on a level 84. You can do even better with Fortify Illusion potions or if you have Champion of the Night from vampirism. Rayzorium (talk) 22:17, February 7, 2013 (UTC) *First of all, the Ebony Warrior was nowhere near easy. He is by far the toughest and most incredible opponent in the game. Sure all of you may think it was easy and thats because we are at level 80. And by then, you may have discovered hundreds of cheap tricks to beating this guy, so have I. If I wanted to I could beat this guy in 10 seconds on master. However if you fight this guy like a man like me (without cheap sneak attacks, no potions or poisons, no shouts) and only head on melee combat such as a swords or whatever, you'll find him to be quite difficult. My hp was at 660 and armor rating over 2000 and my one handed weapon does over 300 points of damage and still was barely able to beat him. Keeping a healing spell in your left hand such as fast healing or close wounds is acceptible and highly recomended. I don't ever want to hear the Ebony Warrior was too easy. He made Skyrim fun and challenging again. LilRay988 Ray Dhimitri 2/5/13 **yeah I guess that makes sense, though I fought him pretty much exactly the same as you just my swords hit 1000 damage instead of 300, but the negative side of that was that if his reflect blows activated it killed me instantly, even with 600hp and 1200 armor rating. As for making the game fun and challenging again, I agree but it only lasts for a matter of minutes :L TheJ00baby (talk) 22:43, February 5, 2013 (UTC) *Too easy? try this: use only weapons or armors improved at most up to legendary quality level 1. Any legendary quality beyond level 1 is considered overpowered. For eg an unenchanted nord hero greatsword with legendary level 1 quality only has a value of 500 and damage of 90 (with relevant skill and perks). Use only weapons or amors enchanted by your own without using the stupid loop and loop glitch of enchanting and alchemy. Ebony warrior is not too easy, just that some people use some stupid overpowered equipment and think it is legitimate. They are just breaking their own game. Better still, if you think you are so good, try to use weapons or armor without putting any perk in smithing, enchanting and alchemy. This is to make sure you have no overpowered equipment. Fight him with no overpowered equipment, then I would want to hear how good you are. **I made this video while ago. Basically, he's still too easy . Rayzorium (talk) 21:43, February 22, 2013 (UTC) **Who cares if the Ebony Warrior is too hard or too easy. Let's face it, at level 80 plus the only hard thing about Skyrim is not using Mayhem and or Mass Paralysis in every town you go to. I mean really, who levels up to 80 and doesn't max out thier perks whether it is mage, warrior or thief. That's the reason for leveling. You max out everything so you can absolutely destroy everything. Well at least that's why I do it. The Ebony Warrior is a quest just like any other one. You either like it or you don't. **For those of you that say he is "too easy" try doing stuff like uping the difficulty, not using potions, companions, or an enchanted weapon.I had a lot of trouble beating him on master with no potions with my level 81 warrior only ever upgraded health had 4 +62 health enchantments (but only 3 of them worked unless I unequipped and reequipped my shield, chest armor, ring, and necklace and then only until I re-loaded a save) so I had 1086 or 1148 health and full legendary daedric armor 1195 total armor rating a legendary dragonbone sword that did 126 damage no enchantment (perks + 10% more effective combat skills from a Black Book) Mora's Boon (Fully heals health, magicka, and stamina once a day also from a black book) Secret of Protection half all physical damage and most magical damage for 30 seconds once a day also from a black book and using Lydia as a companion in full legendary Daedric armor including a shield and a daedric sword and summoned spectral asassin.With all that still died on master a few times against him don't even want to try legendary.On adept beat him first try (I had done research on him) with no companion or spectral assassin and beat him on expert on 3rd try with no companion or spectral assassin.Summary:If he's too easy make him hard by not using every advantage at your disposal and/or uping the difficulty. **First time I'd met this guy (my other character is only about L75, so hadn't read up on him, but I killed him easily in melee. I'd Light Armour at Lvl99, with a few perks, and one-handed at L98 and perks, and a Dragonbone Sword with Absorb Health and Fire Damage. Hit him with Unrelenting Force, and then smacked him a few times. Maybe I was lucky, but I don't seem to have had the issues others are reporting here with him. **He can be easy if you abuse certain game mechanics. But where's the fun in that? Be a man and face him in pure combat without abusing enchanting and alchemy (two schools I despise). His defeat is all the more satisfying. 21:27, December 12, 2013 (UTC) *Using Deadly Dragons mod to make both dragons, and everything else (humanids, creatures, undead etc) stronger made this fight insanely hard for me. I'm a level 84 Dual weilding battlemage, armor capped, magic resist at 80% stacked with fire, frost and shock resist all at 60%, both weapons hitting for 561 and 566 with dual enchants and with my potions each hits for 1300+ , health of 941 and sta regen so high I can't run out of it. That being said everytime his Reflect Blows procs, I one-shot myself. Deadly Dragons makes his health 14k+, armor over 1000 (makng marked for death not very useful), magic resist is capped out, he also does 200% of his normal legendary damage. All in all, three swings from him will kill me if I don't dodge, his health takes forever to get down and I tend to oneshot myself far too often. This fight sucks for me. OneTooMany 07:14, December 14, 2013 (UTC) *Last time I faced the Ebony Warrior I almost made a exact copy of him. I only got rid of the shield and added another Ebony Sword of the Vampire. The fight was not challenging at all. I faced more a challenge killing the Imperial Captain at Helgen. Zu'u lost daal. Alduin1996 (talk) 14:02, August 2, 2014 (UTC) *Man, it's like you all forgot who made this game. Bethesda isn't exactly known for difficulty. Half the main quests don't even contain anything that can be technically defined as real gameplay (Greybeard questline heyoo). Bottom line, Bethesda is more interested in creating interactive storytelling than in games with stories, so don't be so surprised when one of the strongest opponents on the map can't withstand your double-enchanted smithglitched daedric armor of smitefulness. They say the best swords have names, and I named my sword Stagger Spam (LEGENDARY). 07:32, September 5, 2014 (UTC) * *My experience with the guy is different, because I have the Skyrim Redone mod, which changes up the perks and skill trees. I've got a bunch of other mods, too, so for me, the Ebony Warrior behaved a bit differently from what other people describe. He didn't summon, and he healed constantly - anytime his health dipped below half, he healed immediately. And at least his health or armor was higher than what I'm reading here. I was level 78 when I faced him - not sure how that happened, but I actually got the quest at level 75, so my mods must've mixed things up. Anyway, my character had high one-handed and light armor skill, but was mainly specced out as a thief/assassin, and had effectively no magic besides Shouts. I found that if I used my strengths - sneak, archery - it wasn't too difficult. Approaching at night, with Muffle, with shrouded gloves, dagger in each hand, I was able to get up behind him and deal 18x sneak attack/backstab damage with each hand (keeping in mind I use mods). Which didn't kill him, actually, and if I gave him a second, he healed right away - but if I followed that up with a Shout and then just stabby-stabby-stabby, he'd die within a few seconds. Alternatively, I'd approach at night, and shoot from a distance. 3x sneak attack damage, and he'd start doing that "walking around looking for you" thing. I found if I kept moving while shooting, I could get continuous sneak attacks while he was still unaware. And, while he was in this "patrol mode", he didn't heal as often. With all my perks and my archery enchantments, I was dealing about 700-800 per arrow, and so, keeping this up, eventually kill him off. ........................................ But I figured that to do this the right way, I'd have to face him head-on. So I did the honorable warrior thing and went against him man-to-man, and the first few times he crushed me. But experimenting with different styles, I gave up on blocking (because my block score was really low, and even with a shield up, he was destroying my health) and went with dual-wielding. With Skyrim Redone, dual wielders can get a perk which can cancel out some incoming attacks if you time your own correctly. Going with this, and continually taking potions, I was able to actually take him on. But it was pretty much stalemate - he kept healing, I kept healing, neither could kill the other. If I had a streak of proper timed attacks, I could lower his health a bit more than he could heal - but if he hit me with a shout, he could heal himself multiple times while I was getting up ... the fight took about 8 in-game hours, so I guess 30-40 minutes in real life, and that whole mountainside was covered in blood spatter. But then I got in a long streak of continual hits, along with a few poisons, and a Shout, and he went down on one knee and the Killmove played out - and it was a decapitation. It actually bounced and rolled down the mountainside. And I was happy to see that thing go. 16:46, April 4, 2015 (UTC) added an additional strategy The first time I came across this guy, I was nearly Level 100 (I had spent nearly two weeks real-time trying to do everything possible in Solsthiem), and I was coming near Windhelm, and he met me outside the gate. He started with his "I want to go to Sovngarde, please help me," and all that, and I thought, "Ok. I can help you with that." So I did some misc quests and side quests that had two pounds of dust and a little bit of mold growing on it. I completed these and turned them in. At the time I was nearly level 99. After completing that quest with the Gilderglean, I decided if I at least attempted to defeat the Ebony Warrior, there was a chance that I could be victorious. I was wrong. Here was my apparel/weapons/spells equipped/used during the fight: 2 Dragonbone Maces, 1 Fire Enchantment, 1 Frost Enchantment 1 Dragonbone Bow, Soul Trap Enchantment Full set of Dragonplate Armor, with varying enchantments improving One Handed, Archery, giving me waterbreathing, and giving me fire resist Saint Jiub's Locket Ring of the Beast Spells: Ebonyfles Conjure Dremora Lord Grand Healing Bound Sword The first time I just walked up to him and unloaded with my Dragonbone Maces. I died within two seconds due to his Reflect Blows perk. The second time I tried to Summon Dremora Lord after Dremora Lord. Didn't work. His fire resist shrugged off my Dremora's sword enchants, and the Daedric Greatsword did nothing as he had over a billion Heavy Armor perks that made his Armor shoot up to over 600. Suddenly I was out of magicka and I got f***ed up instantaneously. The third time I tried to shoot Daedric Arrows at him with my Dragonbone Bow. He picked up my arrows and shot me with them. Survival time was around 3 minutes. So I was so frustrated that I had to take a gamer's break. While I was looking at the wiki for someway to counter this guy's immense power, I found a way. It wasn't the best, and it took a billion years to perfect to the T, but it worked nonetheless. I noticed Fort Greenwall was very close to Vigil's Rest. So I looked at my world map to determine how far it was from Point A to Point B. It was pretty far, but not far enough to a point that it would be too difficult to do what I planned to do. I made sure that the Stormcloak questline was complete (if you emulate this, you can also complete the Imperial questline as well) to ensure that the inhabitants would serve as a short meatshield for the EW. I also made sure, since Fort Greenwall lies within Stormcloak lines, that the original inhabitants were killed and the Stormcloaks occupied the Fort. First, I started by pickpocketing his bow from him (that was a b****), so he had no choice but to chase me with his sword. I then landed the first blow, and kited him towards Fort Greenwall. When we finally got to the Fort, the EW had an entire army to deal with. The Stormcloaks whiddled down his health as I switched between healing and attacking with Dragonbone Maces. Finally, he died, not to me, but to a Stormcloak's Iron Warhammer. It's ironic, but it worked. I hope this helps someone out there. : Lol, this is so sad... : I'm not laughing at you, but rather the ignominy of the Ebony Warrior's death. I think your strategy was the furthest thing from his mind (yes I know this is a game character) when he decided to challenge you. Nonetheless I think his bravery in taking on a whole fort should easily grant him a place in Sovngarde... : I think the way your gear is set up was the reason why you couldn't beat him. Basically, when you said your gear had "varying enchantments"... Well, that's your problem right there. : It sounds like your character is a good all-rounder, great for the roleplaying Dragonborn. Guess what - EW eats all-rounders for breakfast. What you should have done was specialize. Enchant or buy single-specialization gear, whether in one-handed or archery, just make sure whatever items you pull on make you the best damn exponent of the skill you're gonna use against him. : Seriously. You were about 20 levels more advanced than him... There's no reason on Nirn you needed a whole damn fort of NPCs to do your dirty work for you. : 21:49, March 2, 2015 (UTC)